 Hey friends, welcome to Divine Intimacy Radio behind the scenes. In a minute, I'm going to introduce a friend of ours with a way for you to participate in the Eucharistic Revival. I've been wanting to participate more fully and to provide a kind of positive contribution. I know that there are critics out there who are saying, you know, they don't, you know, not all that impressed with how things are rolling out. And my answer is, so what are you doing about it? And our guest has a great answer for that question because he's the kind of guy who doesn't sit around waiting for other people to tell him what to do or bishops or priests or, you know, we're in the Catholic Church. We love our priests and our bishops. That's great. But oftentimes we sit on our hands and stare at them like they're the ones supposed to be doing everything without us realizing we are the ones who are supposed to doing everything with them. And so we'll talk and assisting and helping. We're assisting and helping. Right. So I'm getting, we're getting behind this effort that you're going to hear about in a minute to really make a difference in restoring, reviving, reverence in the Eucharist. Yeah, that one's I shortened. That's the one to use. And this description as well. I think we should. Let me look here. Yeah. It's the description of what it is. Well, I think we let him describe. OK. Yeah, because I'm going to want to read all that. OK. That just helps us too. OK. And then there's those are key down there. All right. So before we jump into the show, you're watching behind the scenes. So we're making corrections and adjustments on the fly, which our producers are good at because I really twisted them up this morning because we heard about this effort in the last at the last minute. OK. So I want to tell you about a couple of opportunities to be holy and to get holy. One is your marriage, divine intimacy and marriage retreat. This is a retreat made for newly married, about to get married, about to get divorced, want to get better, all that. We've had amazing, amazing outcomes. It's based on Catholic mystical tradition, not what I'd call pop psychology, which is, you know, just or Kumbaya or Kumbaya Catholicism. It's you know, you're not helping me. What are you doing? What are you looking it up? Yes, the dates, right? I am helping you. I'm purpledirection.com forward slash event. She's looking up for the dates. What are the dates that I'm coming with the day coming with the dates? You want to talk about it? But the thing is, we don't let make men act like women. That's a big thing that a lot of retreats do. We don't we don't we allow men to be men and women to be women in terms of their design by God and the fullness of that beauty and reality. And we had this really manly guy come. He didn't want to come. His wife brought him his friends of ours. His wife asked him to go. And by the time it was over, he was telling everybody on the planet about it. And he was standing up, singing. I mean, it was just such a beautiful thing. It was beautiful to watch him just like light up like a Christmas tree. Like this is the best thing ever. And I want everybody I want all couples here. And I'm going to tell everybody about it. And so, you know, ladies, if if you long to see your husband set on fire, talk to him about this retreat. Husbands, if you long for your wives to be set on fire, talk to them about this retreat. It does have a profound effect. The fruit of it is amazing. The last one we had, we had over 100 couples at this last one that we did back about six months ago all over the country and out of the country. And we had about, yeah, all over the place. And we had just to give you. I just want to give you some good numbers here. We had 60 surveys turned in out of the 60 surveys. There was one that was, well, that doesn't matter. There was one that was, you know, whatever it was kind of a meh, two cat, you guys are two Catholic, right? I don't know, whatever it is, right? But all the others, so the other 59 were 10 out of 10. And I was just like, wow, never seen anything like that. I've never seen feedback like that. And it was just really beautiful, 10 out of 10. And we pray for the salvation of the one who didn't like it. But listen, we're here to love and serve you. We didn't, we didn't base it or design it on anybody else's marriage retreat because Dan and I have never been on one. So we just prayed deep. We listened to the Holy Spirit that spoke through another superior that said, you need to do this and you need to do it now. Yeah. And so we followed that and out came our divine intimacy and marriage retreat. You can find more information at spiritualdirection.com forward slash events. The dates are November 3rd through the 5th of this year, 2023. We'll also have another one in February. Same place, Handsville, Alabama at the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament. The venue itself is glorious. And so anyway, we hope that you will join us to dig deep, go deep in your marriage for the sake of your marriage, your unity, kids, the world, the kids, the world, everything. So join us. You ready? Yeah. We're going to jump into the show. OK, on your mark, set, go. This is Dan and Stephanie Burke. Welcome to Divine Intimacy Radio, your radio haven of rest, your hermitage of the heart, your monastery of the mind where we lift our hearts and minds to heaven to draw upon the wisdom of the saints to help us to navigate the tumult of this difficult life. And we have a difficulty in the church, a real serious problem in the church. And that is, of course, most people know that recent surveys revealed that probably I mean, the hard data is 70 percent of Catholics don't believe in the real presence of the Lord in the Eucharist, which makes me just sick. Yes. Well, and I would guess based on, you know, our work with people and what would I used to run a research division for folks on the family? I would guess that it's actually quite a bit higher. The problem is quite a bit worse, even than 70 percent, based on the way Catholics vote, the way Catholics live. There's a tiny percentage of people who really, who really believe. And so the USCCB is undertaking a Eucharistic revival. I think headed by Bishop Cousins, who's a great bishop. And our I've been trying to figure out a way to help not much movement locally. So when I heard about this effort, I got really excited. We changed our radio schedule. The team spun around and and within a few hours, figured out how to get our guests on today. And so Stephanie, why don't you introduce Louis? I'm really happy to introduce our friend, Louis Brown, Jr. He serves as the executive director of the Christus Medicus Foundation, a Catholic health ministry whose mission is to share Christ's healing love by first promoting religious freedom and conscious freedom and conscious in health care, and secondly, by expanding pro-life Catholic medical centers that not only care for pregnant mothers, children and families, but also are an instrument of healing through a deeper encounter with Jesus Christ in the patient's health care. And third, providing the Curo Catholic Health and Wellness Program that serves the whole person, wellness, healing needs of individuals and families across the country. Welcome to our super great friend, Louis Brown. Great to be with you. Now, Louis, this effort seems kind of off mission. I didn't hear Eucharistic adoration in Christ's Medicus. What's going on? What what what got you lit up about this issue? Yeah. So, you know, as you said, our mission is to share the healing love of Christ, particularly in health care. And we, in part, do that through the advance of religious freedom, but also providing programs where people encounter Christ in their health care. So much of what we face at Christ's Medicus is this throwaway culture of death. Francis has talked about Pope Benedict, Pope John Paul, too. And we, as Catholics, for much of the last many years, I've been in the trenches, I've been in government, I've been out of government, I've been in ministry, I've been out of ministry. We have been so focused on politics and legislation, civic engagement as the answer to the culture of death, the throwaway culture of death. And that has its place. It's vitally important that we engage in our civic and our political responsibilities, particularly as Catholics. But what's even more important is the vital need for revival in Jesus Christ, that people know who they are and the Lord Jesus, that they become healed and restored through communion with him and through communion with other people. And so that is the answer to the culture of death. And that's the core of the culture of life. It's the healing communion we experience through seeing the face of God, knowing who we are and bringing our brothers and sisters to him to also be healed and restored and brought into communion. And that's what we're hoping to do through this effort on doing Corpus Christi processions on June 11th and also some days of repentance, the following culminating in the sacred heart of Jesus. I just want to echo what you said. I was I spoke to a private group of Catholic leaders a number of years ago. You know, because they're they're devout Catholic, they're going to be pro-life and so they're going to be to the right of center in terms of politics. Whatever. And it was on the heels of a major political loss for the presidency. And I told them that I thought it was good that they lost because that I thought that they were deluded into thinking that half, you know, there's a lot of bad research, in my opinion, that half of the you know, the US population is pro-life, that, you know, half of them have Christian values. It's not even close. People will say that in surveys. But what they do is really tells you what they believe, right? And I and so I well, I agree that the political process is really important to create a space of freedom. If we really want to see a change in the US, there has to be a revival of faith. That's right. And it and and as the Catholic Church goes, so does a nation, in my opinion. And and and if 70 percent of our members at least don't agree with the one of the most central and important teachings of the faith, then that means 70 percent are not actually converted. That means we're in a world of hurt and we need to get on this. So you got what do you do? Get together with some friends and that's right about this. That's right. Yeah, that's right. One of our co-founders, David Wilson, was just so moved by the reality that the Dobs decision overturning Roe v. Wade happened on the Feast of the Sick of our last year and we started saying, well, we should do something this year. But it became increasingly apparent to David, to myself that that should be not so much a political event, but really a spiritual event, a time of spiritual renewal through the Eucharist. And, you know, it's a longer story that I can I can leave for another time. But through a series of events, the Holy Spirit just spoke to us that we needed to do Eucharistic processions and really connected us with some guidance from Father Craig Vassick, a wonderful priest who is now in the D.C. area to say that, you know what, we need to restore the nation of Christ and that restoration starts with repentance. So not only are we following the lead of the Eucharist of revival, who's already saying, Hey, Parishers, please do Eucharistic processions on the Feast of Corpus Christi, but encouraging people to gather together, whether it's in your home, write your parish with a priest or alone. And do say some prayers of repentance before the Eucharist and repent before the Lord so that our relationship with God can be restored. Amen. Amen. Well, I'm excited about getting the word out about this and helping. Anyway, when I was checking out the site and looking at the resources it's just it's got a huge list of resources. I love this act of reparation prayer by Pope Pius the Seventh. I was grateful you you you put that out there. You know, I do think that the thing that your site does is it and it seems like this was your goal and obviously, you know, what you're trying to achieve. And that is to put out a general call to repentance and reparation, to put out a general call when you do that's all good procession. That's all good. But I think what your what your site does and your effort does is it takes the general idea and the importance and then puts a bunch of practical tools and activities and resources. Like if you've got a priest, a young priest just at a seminary or maybe only a few years out and he's got himself a parish with a thousand families and he's busy and he doesn't he wants to participate, but doesn't quite know what to do. You guys packaged it all up for was that your goal? That was exactly the goal. Thanks to God. Thank you for David Wilson. Thank you to Father Greg Vasek for kind of providing some instruction and guidance, and I particularly Father Craig, who really gave us a lot of theological insight and guidance, put that one of the prayers together. Also, Michael Vaca, who's our head of bioethics and a budding theologian just finishes master's in theology, also a lawyer, graduate of Maria Law School, Michael Vaca helped us put this all together. And I want to say something to just kind of tell you a story. So thanks to God, I recently got married. And one of my closest friends, we've been lifelong friends since we were 16, he was raised in the Muslim faith. And I had the pleasure and the gift of him being a part of our wedding ceremony and also attending. We had the most amazing music at this, at our wedding. Thanks be to God. We had a remarkable homily by a bishop in the Midwest who is a former spirit director, lights out homily, beautiful church in the middle of the mountains, all of that. What was most moving to my friend who was raised in the Muslim faith or was the attendees, the people at our wedding who went up to receive the Eucharist and got down on their knees. You could see that they were taking the Eucharist seriously. Yeah, I was amazed. And I want to tell every bishop I see that story because he he was most impressed and most was most moved by the reception of the body and blood of Jesus Christ. The Lord said, if you do not eat my flesh and drink my body, we will not have life within you. That's the fullness of healing. That's the fullness of restoration. First of all, we as Catholics, as you said, Dan, we need to take this seriously. And so receiving the Eucharist on the tongue, receiving the Eucharist kneeling down, showing that this is the greatest source of power and majesty that we can receive on a day to day basis. We need to reflect the reality. We need to reflect the reality that's going on when we receive the Eucharist. That's number one, as Catholics. And then number two, we need to bring this divine life to other people, regardless of their ethnicity, background, faith, whatever. We need to bring it to our brother, sister, Catholic, but we need to bring it to other people. God wants his children back. And I think that that starts with the Eucharist and the Holy Spirit. God wants his children back. I love that. And I think it's really so beautiful. And I can just imagine for your friend to watch these Catholics go up and what and and for us to understand and him seeing a very in a in a very physical way, Jesus feeding his people through the hands of his priest is the Lord himself that's feeding us. And when if we can remind one another, remind ourselves, remind our children, remind our community, this is Christ himself feeding us through the hands of our priest. And if we will come to him in humility and kneel before him and allow ourselves to be fed as children, then we will experience this healing communion. So we're about to take a break when we come back. What I'd like to do is talk about what do you mean by healing communion? What why why is this an answer to the culture of death and how can we live this more fully? So we'll be right back. Friends, before we jump back into the show, part of the thing, part of the reason the Abba Institute was founded was a lot of to do with what we're talking about today. We founded it because we knew that the formation of the church was very poor, generally speaking, and that folks were languishing spiritually. It's why spiritualdirection.com went from seven readers to two hundred and how many do we have now, Jordan? Two hundred and thirty thousand or so or subscribers with millions of readers was because of spiritual hunger and because it folks aren't just getting fed. And it was founded on the same kind of, I think, energy that Lewis and his friends have for this Eucharistic adoration work. And that is, let's not wait for other people to do something. Let's us do something. Let's figure it out ourselves and get moving and just make sure we're in line with the church. So if you're longing for a deeper relationship with the Lord and you don't know where to go, I can tell you where to go. The Abba Institute. We have courses that are for busy people and for for folks who will want a master's degree or master's certification, I should say, in spiritual theology. Whatever it is, you'll find professors who actually pray, all of them where all of them deeply converted. We do not allow folks to teach for us who are just academics. They have to be academics and men and women of prayer, both. So abba.institute.org. We have a course coming up that is one of the favorites, Introduction to Spiritual Theology taught by Dr. Alfonso Pinto. It is a graduate level course. So it's a disciplined exploration of the progress of the soul and the interior life and the spiritual science, if you will, of the glory of the divine presence at work in us through us to bring us to sainthood. So that's one of many courses. And of course, we have all kinds of school of spiritual formation courses that don't require graduate level study, but that you can just do journaling and that sort of thing to appropriate the content. You have a thought. Well, I was just thinking we also have an awesome event coming up in October because we wouldn't have the Eucharist without the fiat of our lady. Oh, true. And so we have this awesome event called the Marion Mystery and the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart. It's the Avila Summit on the 20 on 2023, dates October 13th. And through the 15th, of course, we chose those dates on purpose. And so please check that out at spiritualdirection.com forward at the last event, not that great, though. Oh, the speaker list is amazing. Bishop Kerry, Clare Dwyer, Father Burns, Father Ignatius Schweitzer, Sister Regina Marie Gorman. She alone will bring the Holy Spirit, Dr. Mark Meravali. Yes, we have just beautiful, beautiful speakers on on our just beautiful mother. I'm so excited about this summit. So if you're looking for spiritual sustenance, hang out with us. Hang out with EWTN. You know how that works. All right, you ready to go? Yep. And your market's at go. This is Dan and Stephanie Burke. Welcome back to Divine Intimacy Radio. We're talking about something that's really important. Are you listening? Are you paying attention? If you're driving, are you paying attention? Maybe pull over because there are not many things that we talk about on the show that are more important than adoring the Lord in the Eucharist. So you had a question for the break. You wanted to throw to our guest, Lewis Brown, who is promoting holyadoration.org, which will help us this year to really turn our hearts and minds to the most important way to worship God in our time in the Eucharist. Go ahead, what's your question? Yeah, absolutely. So we were talking before this beautiful example of folks at his wedding kneeling to receive and his friend as Muslim friend, childhood friend, seeing God's people being fed through the hands of the priests by in person a Chrissy, right? Jesus in the person of our priests feeding his people, his children. And to me, it is healing. Communion is healing. The Lord is healing. I wish I could sing it from the mountaintops. I have to sing it from the radio. But what is this? What do we mean by healing communion? I know what I experience. Can you put it into words? Right. So there's two ways of looking. I think there's two aspects of this, Stephanie. Beautiful what you said. The first is that the Lord really said, if you do not eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will not have life within you. He meant that. It was literal. It's true. And so the fullness of healing. We don't have healing for healing's sake. We know that that's kind of a temptation that some of us, myself, at times can fall into. Healing's not for healing's sake. Healing is for the purpose of being in unit with love itself, with you, Christ, and self. So praise God for that. So we know that in encountering Jesus Christ, we see him, we see his love. But we also encounter who we truly are, which enables us instantly or over time to be unified with him and praise God for that. But then secondly, we also see, and the more that I do healthcare, every step of the way you see how God designed the body and that Catholic teaching isn't just a great way of life, but it is the pathway to life fully alive even in my healthcare outcomes. A few weeks ago, the US Surgeon General who you and I and Dan, we don't agree probably with him on a lot of things, but he put out a report about the epidemic of isolation and loneliness. And what that shows is that social disconnection, social isolation can have negative health outcomes. The equivalent of having smoking 15 cigarettes a day, it can eat increased cardiovascular disease, diabetes, stroke, and on, and on, and on. And so what does he say is the answer? It's community. It is vital. Community is vital to flourishing, to positive health outcomes. A Harvard study that started in the 1930s looked at what do we see as primary indicators of long life, of lifespan, which isn't everything, but it has its place as Martin Luther King once said. And one of the primary indicators of long life and longevity was meaningful relationships. It was community. And so the Lord said that as Bishop Campbell said at a priest, or Bishop Campbell's at Oxley Bishop in DC, and he had a wonderful homily this past Sunday. What the Lord did was he boiled down all of the law, all of the ancient law of the Israelites to two commandments. You should love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, strength, and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself. And so we see healing communion when we say it. And when I say that, when we say that, when our ministry said this is a Christ medic is, we mean communion with Christ, which heals everything, and communion with other people. And we find that in the Eucharist and we find that in bringing others to the Eucharist. So it is truly healing, not just spiritually, but community with God, communion with God, and communion with others is healing and mind, body, and soul. Absolutely. And you know, what's so beautiful, what comes to mind as you're talking about this, Lewis, is that just as our sin is not just our sin, if we sin because we're body and soul together, we're part of the body of Christ, it affects others, nothing happens in isolation. So too, when we come to the Lord in the sacraments, when we come before Him and kneel and become cleansed in the sacrament of penance, and then we come to receive Him in a state of grace, that sets off a channel of grace in and through us to others. I feel like I'm being set on fire just thinking about this and talking about it because if people understood, you have a mission, you were designed for a particular mission in the world. And until you come and you're fed by the body of Christ and you live that in its fullness, you are denying yourself and other people around you who need you. Okay, the booster needs to get a rope. He's levitating, pull her down off the ceiling again. The world needs us to be healed and restored. And when we receive the Lord, then that will happen. That will happen and it affects the world. We are changed and the world changes around us. Amen, sister. Now I wanna make sure we don't get out of here without talking more about the site and getting people more to connect with us. So holyiteration.org, go there, share it on your social media, send it to your pastor. It's the events coming up or June 11th through the 16th, the website outlines all the things that were, that holyiteration is promoting. Do you wanna just talk through that really quick, Louis? Yes, so we're hoping the Eucharist revival sometime ago said, prayers, just please this year, do Eucharistic processions at your parish. And we have to believe that these things, they move in a supernatural way. So if it's five people, if it's 10 people, if it's a hundred people, if it's 500 people, praise the Lord. And so it doesn't take a massive production. We've done, I think we did two processions at Holy Comfort in the last few years. I think both, one was on Corpus Christi, it takes some planning, but it's not a lot. So encouraging people to do Eucharistic processions on the Feast of Corpus Christi, but in talking with Father Craig Vassick, the importance of repentance, I have sinned, I have heard people, I was proud of heard people, I have sinned, right? And I have contributed through my sins to the crucifixion of our war, unfortunately, tragically. And so I need to repent, right? But we also, we're all part of this nation, right? And so we can also repent for the sins of the nation and particularly those sins against the First Commandment. And so we're encouraging people to do that on the days leading up to the Feast of the Sacred Heart. It could be 10 people at a parish, it can be 10 people at home. It's a beautiful prayer that's been put together, but there's power in that in and above itself. The Lord doesn't always use large numbers. Sometimes he creates a numerical explosion, but a lot of times he doesn't. You know, it was three little children at Fatima. It was 12 apostles. And so we're encouraging people in their homes and parishes to get together in those days and do maybe some fasting, do an active repentance and also say those prayers of repentance to our Lord and knowing that he's going to honor them. And even for those that are homebound because there's plenty of people. That's right. We're broadcast through EWTN and I know that for many people, this is their source of information and formation. So wherever you are, even if you can't join others, join us in spirit in praying these and worshiping in this way. Right, those people that are homebound, those, you're spiritual, if you're listening, you're a spiritual warrior, you're doing spiritual combat. And the weapon is love, the weapon is prayer and you're engaging in that. We will only find out in the eternal with our Lord, please God, the power of your prayer. So can't thank you enough. I'm encouraging you to continue to pray. So on the website, there are resources that explain each of the dates, pastoral leadership events. So June 11th, the solemnity of Corpus Christi, what is recommended to happen there, the 12th through the 15th days of preparation and repentance and they provide all of the prayers for each of those events and recommendations. Father Vasik has provided through SoundCloud, even recordings to assist those who will have a communal service of repentance based on a detailed examination of conscience. So you can actually listen to him walk through all of reflections on each of the commandments and then also sins against faith, hope and love. So you just, there's nothing you need other than you, your will, your desire, but if you're able to get your pastor involved or your parish involved, there's everything that a priest would need to do that's never done that. Thursday, June 15th, all night vigil of adoration and preparation. Friday, June 16th, solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Optional Saturday, June 17th, Memorial of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And then there's a list of scriptural prayers, liturgical prayers, mass readings and prayers, examination of conscience, acts of reparation to make atonement to the heart of Jesus, acts of worship, Thanksgiving, church documents, pastoral resources. I just, I wanna kind of bring us home with this. When I had COVID, I had a really profound spiritual experience. It almost killed me, nine out of 10 people with my condition, with the first pass of COVID died. And I almost died. When I came out of it, I had something in my head and I don't know if, I don't wanna blame it on the Lord, but it came. And that was, I realized that, you know, while so many of us are quick to blame priests and bishops and all of that, the most grave evil that is committed in mass, and I mean on mass, I mean, in terms of the number of times it's committed by the number of people in the Catholic church is profanation and committing sacrilege against the Lord in the Eucharist. It's going to receive communion unworthily with mortal sin in our hearts. It's going to receive the communion in an irreverent state. It's dropping the Lord on the floor because we insist on pecking at him with our fingers. It, you know, all of these different things, what happened during COVID in some ways made things worse in many places. We need to make reparation for all these grave sins. We need to figure out who he is and who we are and what we're doing in the Holy sacrifice in the mass. And until we do that, the church won't turn around and the country won't turn around and the world won't turn around. So go out to holyadoration.org. Get all you need to be equipped to support your parish, your friends, everything you need. We'll have this post out on spiritualdirection.com if you forget the URL if you're driving. But holyadoration.org. Lewis, thanks for all your great work. Please thanks all your friends behind the scenes for helping make this work. We're going to do everything we can to promote it. And we're really excited to really try to turn the corner in this area. Thank you so much for everything you're doing, Abba. I'm a huge admirers and you all inspire me to such a great extent and I can't promote. Everyone should go to the summit. I hope to be there. I was there last year, the Abba summit this fall. I'm excited and just so grateful for the two of you. Thank you. Yeah, so grateful for your friendship. Thank you. Until next time, may the God of peace make you perfect in holiness. May he preserve you whole and entire. Spirit, soul and body irreproachable at the coming of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen.